Kiva Sea Shanty Video - Rolling Down to Old Maui

At RenCon 2010, Kiva performed Rolling Down to Old Maui, a song that expresses the anticipation of the crew of a whaling vessel on its return to Hawaii after a season of whaling in the Kamchatka Sea.

Rolling Down to Old Maui Lyrics

It's a damn tough life full of toil and strife
We sailermen undergo.
And we don't give a damn when the gale is done
How hard the wind did blow.
We're homeward bound with a grand old town
With a good ship, taut and free
And we won't give a damn when we drink our rum
With the girls of Old Maui.
(chorus)
Rolling down to Old Maui, me boys
Rolling down to Old Maui
We're homeward bound from the Arctic ground
Rolling down to Old Maui.
Last month we sailed in a northerly gale
Through the ice and wind and rain.
Our mast and yards were sheathed in ice
And our decks were white again.
The jagged towers of sea-cut ice
That round the Arctic sea
We left behind in the frozen north
When we turned for Old Maui
chorus
But now we sail with a favorly gale
Towards our island home.
Our mainmast sprung, our sailing done,
And we ain't go far to roam.
Six hellish months have passed away
In the cold Kamchatka sea
But now we're bound from the Arctic ground
Rolling down to Old Maui
chorus
How soft the breeze through the island trees,
Now the ice is far astern.
Then them pretty maids, in their lively ways
Is a-waiting our return.
Even now their big brown eyes look out
Hoping some fine day to see
Our baggy sails runnin' 'fore the gales
Rolling down to old Maui.
chorus